


The Maker's Light

by Dragonflies_and_Katydids



Series: Off Label [9]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Communication, Dom/sub, Emotional Baggage, Forced Orgasm, I'm Bad At Tagging, M/M, Masochism, Navel-Gazing, Past Rape/Non-con, Rope Bondage, Subspace, Trust, but they all apply?, i could save time and just tag every story in this series with that one, maybe too much, oh well, ok that's kind of a weird collection of tags
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-07
Updated: 2017-09-07
Packaged: 2018-12-24 20:38:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12020565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dragonflies_and_Katydids/pseuds/Dragonflies_and_Katydids
Summary: The night before the fight with the archdemon. Nothing like the threat of imminent death to make people sort through their emotional baggage.(Probably not the place to start for this series. You could make a drinking game out of all the callbacks in this story to the rest.)





	The Maker's Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Earlgreyer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Earlgreyer/gifts).



> For earlgreyer, because it's all her fault this series is a series, and not a semi-crackfic one-shot. *blows kisses*
> 
> *************************************
> 
> Somewhere on tumblr is a video of a sub, tied to a chair and made to come six or seven (or more?) times in a relatively short period of time. If anyone knows where I might find it, let me know so I can post a link. :) It was definitely inspirational here, but now I can't find it.

Tomorrow.

The word hums in Alistair's head from the moment his eyes open at dawn, and it follows him all day: through breaking camp, and marching all day in the rain, and arriving in late afternoon at the home of a very flustered and overwhelmed bann. A bann who has the misfortune to be within a short march of Denerim and yet is fortunate enough to be north of the city rather than east or south. Those lands are burning ruins now, a fate they're all aware could fall on this bannorn soon enough.

For tonight, though, the bann and her family cede their home--apparently gladly--to the royal party and the armies' commanders. That's something Alistair still isn't accustomed to, though Anora accepts it in a tone that manages to be gracious while also acknowledging it as her due. Her ready acceptance is for all of them, and so Alistair only has to be silent and allow himself to be shown to his room for tonight. It will be worse tomorrow, he knows: assuming any part of it remains habitable, he'll sleep in Denerim's palace tomorrow night.

Either that, or he'll be dead, and right now, he's only half convinced that's the worse option.

Another thought that hovers just below his awareness all day, one he's even more reluctant to acknowledge than that steady litany of _tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow._ Dying is easy, after all, and being king is anything but. He would feel like a coward, except that a small part of him resents being asked to give up one more thing for his country.

He's still wrestling with too many emotions when he finishes going over tomorrow's strategy one last time and is allowed to retreat to his room. His empty room, made gloomy by the rainy afternoon. Zevran is around somewhere--Alistair saw him several times today, if always at a distance--but it's not even dusk yet, and nightfall is the earliest Alistair has seen him during the last week.

The reminder that he _will_ be here, even if he's not here now, makes the room feel a little less empty, and Alistair rolls his shoulders, trying to relax. Soon enough, Zevran will come sliding out of the shadows the way he has every evening, grinning at his own ability to sneak past the guards even as he admonishes Alistair about the need for vigilance. All Alistair has to do is find a way to avoid thinking about tomorrow until then.

And to avoid prodding the memory of Zevran agreeing to stay "for a while." Alistair is developing quite a list of things to not think about, and that might very well be the one he works hardest to ignore. What does "a while" mean? Today is certain, tomorrow almost equally so. But what about the day after? And the day after that? Alistair hasn't dared to ask, for fear that asking might change the answer in the wrong direction.

 _This isn't helping,_ he reminds himself. For someone trying to avoid thinking about these things, he's dwelling on them far too much.

He focuses deliberately on the physical world and looks around the room, struck by the strange juxtaposition of his belongings and someone else's. Anora took over the bann's chambers, which likely means the bann's oldest son normally sleeps here. The bedsheets have been freshly changed and the room hastily cleaned in preparation for its royal--if temporary--occupant, but there are a hundred signs that someone else actually lives here. It only makes Alistair feel more out of place, and he's quick to grab his pack when he finally spots it, half under the bed.

It's the same pack he's carried for over a year, despite recent subtle and unsubtle attempts by Eamon, Anora, and a variety of others to take it from him and replace it with something more suited to his new station. Alistair resisted initially out of surprise, and then out of stubbornness, and now out of a desperate need for something familiar. The pack is battered, scarred by weather as much as by blades, but Alistair doesn't care.

He turns it carefully out on the rug by the fire, sorting through the contents until he finds all of the tokens Mahariel has given him over the last year. They're comforting in their weight and familiarity, a reminder that their time on the road had as many bright moments as dark. Much easier right now to think of that, rather than the prospect of dying tomorrow, and the equally terrifying prospect of not dying.

Alistair takes a deep breath and tries again to stop thinking. Zevran will be here soon enough, and then they can wear themselves down until both of them can sleep.

The last of Mahariel's tokens is tangled in the coil of rope he always carries, and he picks both up to separate them, only to freeze as memory hits him. With his thoughts still half on Zevran, the feel of the rope drags him back to that night in the rain, Zevran bound and cradled against him. That was the first and only time they used the rope like that; they never tried again, not after the way things ended. Alistair found other ways to pin Zevran in place, and Zevran is creative enough that it never felt like anything was lacking.

But now, for the first time, it isn't the disastrous end that Alistair remembers. Instead, he remembers the first part, Zevran melting against him, trembling as he spilled into Alistair's hand. Controlled by something less tangible than physical force. The rope bound him, certainly, but it wasn't the rope that held him still when he could have fought. There was such a rush of power in that, a rush Alistair had forgotten under everything else, that he's only now remembering. A rush he'd like to feel again, without an interruption from the weather.

He glances at the shuttered window and listens to the rain pattering against it. Nothing at all like the rain that night, but very little else is like that night, either. Maybe...maybe other things can change as well?

Anxiety and arousal spike through him together, and he twists the rope between his hands. Can he even bring himself to ask Zevran for this, when his memories of that night can't be any better than Alistair's? Actually, his are probably worse, given what he said afterward and what memories it must have stirred up.

Behind Alistair, the sound of the rain gets louder, and he turns just as Zevran drops through the window and lands in a crouch on the floor. His hair and clothes are soaked through, but he grins at Alistair as he straightens.

"Such a lovely evening, isn't it?" he asks, pushing wet hair from his face. "Why did I not leave Antiva sooner, if this weather is so typical of Ferelden?"

Alistair smiles reluctantly, toying with the rope. "Don't forget about the snow in winter."

Zevran shudders dramatically. "Trust me, cachorro, I have not."

 _Cachorro._ A name Zevran calls him constantly, now, though he's never said what it means. If Alistair can't even bring himself to ask about that, how can he expect to ask for anything involving the rope?

Across the room, Zevran is watching him intently. "And what are you thinking about, that you frown so?"

The words pop out before Alistair can stop them. "What's it mean?"

"What does what mean?" Zevran asks, eyebrows rising.

"Cachorro." He's heard the word so often, his tongue almost manages the trilled "R" at the end.

Zevran doesn't answer immediately. Instead, he pulls the shutters closed and latches them with unnecessary care before he turns back to the room. There's a wariness to him now, or at least, Alistair thinks there is. He still isn't sure he trusts his own ability to read the subtle clues Zevran's face and body provide.

"Is it that bad?" Alistair asks with forced humor.

"Not...bad, as such," Zevran says. He wrings the water from his hair with the same deliberate thoroughness he used to latch the shutters, his head tilted to the side so that he's looking at a darkened corner of the room. "It means cub. Pup." He begins to unbraid his hair, effectively hiding his face behind his arm. "Puppy, you Fereldans would say."

"Puppy," Alistair repeats. Perhaps in another time and place, he would be insulted, but right now, all he can think of is Zevran whispering, _"Howe was a wolf, cachorro, and you are nothing like him."_

He looks down at the rope in his hands as the Zevran of memory adds, _"When I said 'paz,' you stopped."_ Is that what Zevran remembers of that night? Not what came before or after, but that when he asked Alistair to stop, Alistair stopped? The part that's stuck with _Alistair_ all these months is that Zevran had to say it more than once.

_"When you heard, you stopped."_

"My apologies," the here-and-now Zevran says quietly. "It was never meant to mock you."

"What?" Alistair asks, head snapping up in surprise and momentary confusion before he finds his place in the conversation again. "No, I know, I didn't think you were."

Zevran hums a vaguely skeptical acknowledgement, his arm still hiding his face. He's finished unbraiding his hair and begun combing it out with his fingers, something Alistair has watched him do a hundred times. Tonight, it's mesmerizing, and Alistair's mouth moves before his brain has time to catch up. "I trust you."

More words with echoes, though fainter. He thinks back several months, remembers Zevran making a seemingly-impossible offer as if it were nothing, perhaps the first time Alistair had ever seen him entirely serious. They talked of trust then, too, Alistair sick with guilt and shame while Zevran spoke so easily of the very things that made Alistair hate himself.

_"I have told you that I enjoyed it," Zevran said, "I have shown you that I enjoyed it. You must decide whether you will trust me, or not."_

Ridiculous, to trust a Crow with anything, much less this. And yet, Alistair had done it, desperate for even the illusion that people wouldn't call him a monster for the things he wanted. Even after everything he saw in Howe's dungeon, he doesn't regret that decision. Zevran has never given him reason to.

"I trust you," Alistair repeats, heart beating in his throat. "You...you tease me, sometimes you tease me a lot, but you don't...you don't mock me. You never have. Not like that."

"Ah." Zevran's arm is _still_ blocking his face, his fingers now working quickly to braid his hair back up.

Alistair's fingers itch with the sudden need to take the braid away. He knows exactly what Zevran's hair feels like clenched in his fist as he drags Zevran's head back. He wants to know what it feels like sliding between his fingers as he combs it out and braids it up. There have been opportunities in the past, but he's always been afraid to try for fear Zevran would think it childish or silly. Certain intimacies have always been off limits.

Watching Zevran now, Alistair wonders if they would still be, and if he's brave enough to find out.

###

Zevran knows he can't hide his face much longer, but he needs those few extra moments to gather himself back together. People don't profess their trust in Crows, not if they know who they're speaking to. He's not sure he knows anyone who's ever trusted him.

Though looking back, it's been there the entire time. Alistair spent years hiding certain parts of himself from everyone, and yet, he shares those secrets with Zevran. The first time might have been thoughtless, but that can't be said of the rest. Strange what a difference it makes to hear it said so plainly.

His hair is braided, if still wet, and he can't hide his face any longer, so he drops his hands and turns back to the room. Alistair is watching him from where he sits by the fire, brows drawn down in anxious thought. Regretting his words? Regretting his trust? Or perhaps only considering what a mess tomorrow's fight will be, after today's rain.

The reminder of tomorrow sends a chill through Zevran that has nothing to do with wet clothes. They face the archdemon tomorrow, or at least, Alistair and Mahariel do. Morrigan's ritual is finished, but that doesn't stop Alistair from taking a more...traditional path. Does he still see it as his duty to die and take the archdemon with him?

Questions Zevran doesn't want to think about, that he came here to save both of them from thinking about. There are a number of ways to do that, but Zevran isn't one for praying and neither of them is much for drinking. Staring at the walls until dawn is always a possibility, if Zevran doesn't mind being utterly mad when they begin their final march. Since he does mind, that really only leaves one option.

He smiles at Alistair and is relieved when he gets a smile in return. "No, cachorro," he agrees. "I would not mock you."

To his surprise, Alistair laughs. "Can we at least pretend it's a mabari puppy?"

"You are Fereldan," Zevran says with a shrug. "What else would you be?"

It pleases him when Alistair grins, and he takes a step forward, only to pause when Alistair's smile disappears and his hands pull in against his stomach. Guilty, as if he's trying to hide whatever he's holding, before he visibly forces himself to relax.

That's intriguing enough to distract Zevran from his teasing, and he moves forward until he can see the rope Alistair is throttling between his hands.

Oh.

Now that's a game they haven't tried since the first time ended so badly, and heat sparks in Zevran's gut, fanned rather than extinguished by the accompanying fear. It occurs to him that the two together--fear and lust--would make an even better distraction than lust alone. If Alistair is willing, which is by no means a given.

Stepping carefully in more ways than one, Zevran crosses the rug to kneel in front of Alistair. He touches the rope, letting his fingers brush over Alistair's in the process, and asks, "Did you have plans for this, then?"

Alistair flushes and looks away, then looks back almost immediately, searching Zevran's face. "Not...not plans, not really, just...thinking."

"Thinking," Zevran says, stroking his fingers over Alistair's again. "And what were you thinking about?" He smiles slowly. "Were you thinking about me, bound at your feet, to do with as you wish?"

Alistair licks his lips and this time when he looks away, his gaze remains fixed on the rug by Zevran's knee. "I don't...I mean, yes, but...I don't know how you...I don't know what you...what you want?"

How the same man can sometimes be so confident and sometimes so hesitant is a mystery to Zevran. One he'll ponder some other time. For now, he puts a hand on Alistair's shoulder and leans in to put his mouth by Alistair's ear. "And if I were to say yes, I want it, what would you do with me then? Would you tie me to that lovely bed, mark me everywhere with your teeth and then stroke yourself while I watched? Or would you force me to kneel, to take your cock until you spend yourself in my mouth?"

There's no answer from Alistair, but his breath has picked up, warm as it stirs Zevran's hair.

"Or the desk," Zevran says thoughtfully. "It looks quite sturdy. Would you bend me over it? Spread my legs wide and tie them thus," his tongue almost stumbles before he catches himself, "so you might fuck me as long as you wish?"

He stops there, surprised at his own words. Allowing Alistair to tie his wrists is one thing, a thing he's certain he would enjoy, and it isn't as if he's _never_ allowed his ankles to be bound. Just...not when he's had another option. The times he's allowed his feet to be tied, it's never been about his pleasure.

To hide his confusion, he kisses Alistair's cheek then rises easily to his feet. Holding out one hand, he grins. "While you consider that, perhaps you would also consider a bath. I believe we might both benefit from one, unless the smell of horse excites you."

"Not really, no," Alistair says, laughing. He takes the offered hand and lets Zevran help him to his feet, looking around the room as he does. "But I don't think a real bath is in our future, either."

"At least the water will be hot," Zevran points out. There's a pitcher of water on a table beside the hearth, likely left by the servants who cleaned the room prior to Alistair's arrival, and Zevran can see rising steam from here.

It's a step down from Redcliffe's baths, but a decided step up from the last week and most of the last year. Wet as Zevran's clothes are, it still doesn't take him long to strip out of them, and he's naked before Alistair has managed to do more than remove his shirt and tunic.

Zevran takes advantage of that to tease, turning his own bath into a show for Alistair's benefit, rubbing more soap than necessary onto his hands so that they slide easily over his chest and stomach and cock. To his secret amusement, Alistair nearly forgets to remove his boots before trying to unfasten his trousers, and it takes him long enough to detangle himself that Zevran's skin chills. He leaves off teasing Alistair in favor of taking a wet cloth to rinse away the soap, hurrying a little as a thought occurs to him.

By the time Alistair is reaching for a cloth of his own, Zevran is ready, if still a bit damp. He plucks the cloth from Alistair's hand and blinks innocently when Alistair looks at him.

"I can wash myself," Alistair says, catching Zevran's hand as it reaches for the soap. "Even us Fereldans have figured that one out."

"I know." Zevran doesn't try to pull his hand free, just turns it to twine his fingers through Alistair's. "But let me do this for you?" He hesitates, then adds softly, "Please, amo?"

It gets exactly the reaction he hoped, Alistair's hand squeezing hard as he sucks in a sharp breath. What reaction would it get, Zevran wonders, if Alistair knew exactly what the word meant? He's likely made some reasonable guesses, but Zevran has avoided using the word as carefully as he's avoided suggesting Alistair tie him up before fucking him.

Alistair releases his hand, and Zevran steps closer, pulse picking up speed. He starts with Alistair's neck and shoulders, moving gradually down his arms, over his chest and stomach, and finally down to curl a soapy hand briefly around his cock. Just for a moment, long enough to make Alistair gasp, before he moves on.

He doesn't hurry, giving it all the careful attention of a holy ritual. It's the same attention he gives to sharpening a good blade, which is perhaps the closest thing any Crow has to prayer, this dedication of an otherwise mundane task to something greater than himself. An offering of his time as proof of his devotion.

Whether Alistair understands that or not, he doesn't protest again. He turns according to the pressure of Zevran's hands, bends his neck or lifts his foot, holds out one hand and then the other. Zevran washes every inch of his skin, as thorough with his toes as with his cock, careful to rinse the cloth regularly enough to keep it warm. When he's done, he dries Alistair off, as thorough as he was while washing him. His hair remains a bit damp at the end, but it's short enough that it will dry before his head is anywhere near a pillow.

Skin starting to burn, Zevran folds the towel carefully and sets it aside, then turns away to step closer to the fire. He doesn't need to look back to know Alistair is watching him; the weight of his gaze is nearly tangible, and Zevran makes very sure that when he kneels, he does it gracefully. Properly. The tops of his feet flat to the floor, shoulders back, head up and eyes closed, hands palm down on his thighs with the fingers together and parallel to his thighs. Alistair won't recognize the position for what it is, won't know that Zevran was instructed in this as carefully as anything else the Crows taught him, but he'll recognize subservience.

The fire is warm on his face, and the rug under him is soft and thick, keeping out the chill of the stone floor. He could kneel here a long time, quite comfortably, but Alistair doesn't make him wait. Barefoot he might be, but he makes no effort to be quiet, and Zevran can follow his movements as he crosses to where they left the rope.

The heat in Zevran's skin flares hotter. _Yes,_ he wants to say, but he stays silent. He wants it entirely clear--for so many reasons--that this is Alistair's choice as much as his.

He's nearly holding his breath by the time the footsteps return, slow and measured as they approach. With his eyes closed he can't say whether Alistair moves slowly from reluctance or from a desire for control, and he listens carefully, hoping for some sign.

"Put your hands behind your back," Alistair says, quietly commanding, and Zevran is quick to comply.

The rope is rough against his skin, scraping lightly as Alistair binds his hands together, a faint warmth that could easily become a burn after only a little struggling. Zevran holds still for now, not wanting to give Alistair any reason to stop.

His resolve wavers when Alistair touches the small of his back, encouraging him to rise off his heels so the rope can go around his ankles. It scares him, and yet, he wants it. _"I trust you,"_ Alistair said, and Zevran missed his chance to say it back, isn't sure he could have even if he'd thought fast enough. He trusts Alistair more than he trusts anyone, himself included, but saying so is something else entirely. Now it burns in his chest, this need to prove that trust, to say with his body what he can't say aloud.

The rope tightens as Alistair hobbles his ankles so closely that walking would be impossible, and Zevran forces himself to relax. Whatever the Crows might have done to him, Alistair isn't one of them.

Cachorro.

 _"Can we at least pretend it's a mabari puppy?"_ The memory makes Zevran smile internally, and it becomes a little easier to relax.

With his hands tied, it's difficult enough to keep his balance while kneeling, and that lets him concentrate on not falling over until Alistair touches his elbow and guides him back down. He doesn't get a chance to settle, though: Alistair's hand stops him just shy of sitting on his heels, and another strand of rope loops through the knots around his wrists. It's so unexpected that it isn't until Alistair pulls the rope taut, dragging him forcibly down to sit on his heels, that he realizes what Alistair has done.

###

Alistair fights to keep his breathing and his hands steady as he ties off the last knot, caught in a stomach-churning combination of fear and arousal. He wants this more than he could admit even to Zevran, but he can't stop thinking about all the things that could go wrong. There are so many ways he could hurt Zevran, and no way now for Zevran to fight back. Tied as he is--wrist to wrist, ankle to ankle, and all of it looped together so he can't sit any way except with his back perfectly straight--he's almost completely helpless.

He can speak, though, or shout if he needs to, and Alistair reminds himself of that as he tucks the tail end of the rope out of the way. No risk of torn canvas here, nothing at all to interfere with Zevran's ability to say the watchword.

His gaze flicks sideways to his sword belt, out of the way but in easy reach if Zevran does say the word. Alistair won't forget that lesson, any more than he can forget the rest of that night.

Those memories are a little too close right now, and he takes a moment to breathe, trying to force them away. If Zevran is aware that the pause is for anything other than effect, he gives no sign: he waits silently, his body as relaxed as it can be with the rope forcing his shoulders back. Even his hands are relaxed, the fingers curled loosely. They twitch slightly when Alistair brushes his own fingers over them, but nothing more.

Despite Zevran's obvious willingness, Alistair is only half hard now. The memory of the last time intrudes constantly, anxiety tingling in his hands and tightening his throat, even as he begins to get irritated with himself. He started this, and he wants it badly when he can forget all the what-ifs running through his head. The fact that he's ruining the evening for Zevran only makes it worse.

Alistair takes another deep, silent breath. If he can't make his own body cooperate, that doesn't stop him from ensuring Zevran gets what he wants. It might even be easier tonight than any other night, since Zevran can only know what Alistair allows him to see and feel.

One thing he's learned in all these months, and not just from Zevran: sometimes the appearance of confidence is more important than the reality.

He stands and circles Zevran, fingertips brushing his hair and the tip of one ear so that Zevran knows where he is and doesn't startle when Alistair takes his jaw firmly to tilt his head up. Eyes still closed, Zevran doesn't fight against the movement, and it's easy to raise his head far enough that he can't see anything but Alistair's face.

"Look at me," Alistair says.

Zevran's eyes open, focusing on Alistair's immediately. There's a question in them, and Alistair grabs every scrap of confidence he can muster.

"Don't make a sound unless I ask you a question," he says, proud when his voice doesn't shake. "And don't move unless I move you." He could leave it there, but he needs a little more reassurance, needs to hear Zevran say, in one form or another, that this is what he wants. "Do you understand?"

"Yes, amo," Zevran says softly.

Alistair manages to bite back both "good" and "thank you," and says instead, "Close your eyes. Don't open them again unless I say."

Zevran's eyes close immediately, but that quick obedience does nothing to push away the memory of him choking on a mouthful of water. Alistair turns away from it as best he can, focusing on the better parts of that night. Maybe he can start from there and put himself back in the right frame of mind.

A thought strikes him, and he glances over his shoulder at the contents of his pack, still strewn on the floor. Maybe, if he goes back to the beginning, he can find the way forward.

###

When Alistair moves away, Zevran has to fight the impulse to open his eyes, or at least turn his head to follow the sound of retreating footsteps. The rope still holds him, forcing his back to bow slightly, so he doubts the game is over, but he's deeply curious what's drawn Alistair away from the enticing display that Zevran knows he makes.

By the sound of his footsteps, Alistair has only gone as far as the collection of his belongings, but what he's looking for, Zevran has no idea. Whatever it is, he finds it quickly and returns to kneel at Zevran's back, close enough that his spread thighs bracket Zevran's hips. Even with a few inches between them, the heat of his skin is a match for the fire burning on the hearth.

His hand when he cups Zevran's shoulder is even hotter--unnaturally so--and Zevran bites back another smile as he realizes what Alistair must have gone looking for. This jar of warming balm is more concentrated than what they used the first time, but it still feels good. It's soothing, like the hot bath they couldn’t have tonight, the heat sinking into his skin almost immediately.

Alistair's hand drifts along Zevran's collarbone and then down the center of his chest, leaving a trail that burns hotter the lower Alistair goes. Warming balm on his arms is nothing new, but there's never been a need to apply it to skin covered by his armor, and Zevran is startled to realize what a difference that makes. He doesn't normally consider any part of his body delicate, but as Alistair paints stripes along his ribs, Zevran's fingers twitch involuntarily. What was nothing but a pleasant heat on his shoulder is very nearly hot when applied to his stomach.

And very definitely hot when applied to his nipples. Zevran has to control a gasp as Alistair's thumb rubs the warming balm in, and his control almost slips when Alistair pinches. It's not a hard pinch, but the combined sensation goes straight to his cock. He wants to ask for more, harder, wants to feel Alistair's fingernails driving deep into the burning skin.

Then he forgets about that as Alistair moves on: first one finger following the creases between leg and hip, then two fingers drawing a line down the inside of each thigh, then three fingers dipping into the hollows at his groin. The heat spreads, burning lines that meet and merge until his whole body feels like a melting candle, wax turning to liquid and feeding the flame at the center.

Alistair's hand on his cock is almost too hot, just this side of painful. The wrong side, Zevran thinks; he wants the edge that pain adds to the pleasure. The rope makes up for that lack, though, the knowledge that he's vulnerable making his heart pound the way it does in a fight. Training and experience both remind him of all the things that can happen to him like this, and it brings back enough of the fear to make him more aware than he is at any other time.

Right now, he's most aware of Alistair: his hands, his breath, the hot weight of him pressing against Zevran's back and bound arms. The rope drags his hands down almost to the floor, his knuckles brushing the soles of his feet. It leaves him off-balance, tilted backward just enough that all his instincts want him to move, to somehow find a position that isn't quite so precarious. With Alistair's chest right up against him and Alistair's arms wrapped around him, Zevran has rarely been this helpless.

The hand on his cock begins to move, one slow stroke from the base to the crown, Alistair's hand sliding up and up until it's no longer on his cock at all. His fist is almost too tight when he brings it back down, forcing it over the head of Zevran's cock and all the way down the shaft. The pressure and heat together are far more intense than either one alone, and for a moment, Zevran can't even breathe.

At the base of his cock, Alistair's hand pauses, twisting a little before rising again. His grip is still right on the edge of too tight, and the warming balm is still burning on Zevran's skin, and when his other hand cups Zevran's balls, Zevran huffs out a breath that's almost a groan. Every place Alistair touched, every line he drew, burns hot, and Zevran's nipples ache, deep under the skin.

It's been a long time since Zevran found his control actually tested. Even on the few occasions in the past when they didn't have to rush, Zevran has never had to fight his body to keep from finishing too early. Alistair hasn't shown any interest in that kind of game, whether because he's truly not interested or because he simply hasn't thought of it, and Zevran hasn't felt the need to point it out to him. It's not that Zevran dislikes those games; it's just that he likes other games better.

And so now he's out of practice as his skin burns and Alistair strokes his cock with a tight fist. Every movement of Alistair's hand drags him closer to the edge, and there's a dizzying moment where he thinks he's going to lose control. Why Alistair has suddenly developed an interest in this game is a mystery, but Zevran grits his teeth and hangs on to his control.

Years of training help him focus on ignoring the heat trying to gather together into something more. Finishing this early would be embarrassing under any circumstances, but tonight it would be more than embarrassing. Whatever Alistair wants from him, Zevran will just have to hold on long enough to find out what he's supposed to do.

That thought centers him, and he holds to it, stares at it from behind closed eyelids as intently as ever he's watched a target. This is what Alistair wants, and nothing else matters.

_This is what Alistair wants._

It's a prayer, words repeated over and over to keep his attention where it belongs, and he hardly notices the way his mind is beginning to drift. Not into sleep, not exactly, but into a place where this circle of firelight is disconnected from the rest of the world. Like the Fade, if the Fade had ever shown him anything except pain.

"Stop fighting me," Alistair says in his ear.

The words shock Zevran a little way back to reality. Fighting? Fighting how?

"You're not in control." Alistair's hand strokes faster, the fingers of his other hand twisting Zevran's nipples. "Let go."

His thoughts are slow, his brain trapped in thick mud. Alistair's command to let go pushes against all those years of training, two sets of contradicting orders. Zevran knows his role here, except he knows two different things. Stay in control--of his own body if nothing else--give Alistair what he wants, except Alistair is saying that what he wants is for Zevran to _not_ be in control-

"Let. Go." The last word is a growl, harsh and low, and Zevran's mind trips over itself, confused. In that moment of confusion, his body fills his awareness, everything erased in a surge of heat.

 _"Now."_ Not a growl this time but an order, and Zevran comes, gasping and shocked as it burns through him.

###

Zevran gasps, almost a groan, and Alistair would punish that as disobeying his original order to be silent if he could think clearly about anything except Zevran's cock pulsing in his hand. His own cock is hard now, the sound of Zevran choking on the watchword drowned by the rush of blood in his ears. For the first time tonight--for the first time in months--he feels entirely in control, not just of himself but of everything that happens in this room.

He's not ready to give that up yet, and so he lets his hand continue to stroke lazily over Zevran's cock even as it begins to soften. Small twitches occasionally jerk Zevran's body tight, an involuntary protest against a touch that has to be painful on over-sensitive flesh, but he doesn't say the watchword and he doesn't pull away. If anything, he's leaning into Alistair more than ever, and when Alistair touches his forehead, Zevran's head immediately tips back to rest on his shoulder. The weight of his body feels good, and his hair smells pleasantly of sweat when Alistair presses his nose into it.

With no reason to stop, Alistair keeps going, concentrating on nothing but Zevran. He's so focused on the minute details, on the heat of Zevran's skin and the slick glide of his own hand and the tremors that occasionally run through both of them, that it's a surprise when he realizes Zevran's cock is once again growing hard. It lengthens and thickens in his hand, and Alistair is struck by a sudden idea.

Curious, he tightens his grip and strokes harder, faster. Zevran's breathing turns ragged again, the muscles in his back and arms flexing against the ropes, but he makes no protest, not even a real attempt to fight the rope. The back of his skull digs painfully into Alistair's collarbone as his throat works to suppress any noise, his body shuddering in waves until he spends himself again, this time without making any sound at all.

The feeling of power that fills Alistair is as heady as winning an impossible fight, as arousing as Zevran's mouth around his cock. He could finish himself off so easily, take any of Zevran's earlier suggestions: untie the ropes and fuck Zevran here in front of the fire, or stand to slide his cock into Zevran's mouth so he can drown in that wet heat, or simply take himself in hand until he's marked Zevran's skin with his seed, the way he so often does with his teeth.

Rather than do any of those things, he rubs his clean hand over Zevran's chest and waits for him to stop shaking. Only once he's breathing normally does Alistair begin again. Leisurely strokes to coax him back to hardness, then quicker ones to make him gasp and shake. It's not as easy as before, Zevran's body slower to respond, but the time slips away unnoticed, and eventually Zevran spills into his hand for a third time.

It hits Alistair, too late, that Zevran has by now almost certainly moved beyond over-sensitive and into actual pain. The realization is uncomfortably like a faceful of cold water, and it dims both his confidence and his arousal.

He manages not to bolt to his feet, but it's a near thing, and he kneels for several long breaths, frozen in place while his thoughts spin. Zevran hasn't said the watchword, but that doesn't mean he's actually enjoying this. His tolerance for pain is disturbingly high, and a physical reaction is just that: purely physical, something Alistair knows can exist outside the mind's actual desire for it.

Inside the circle of his arms, Zevran has gone still, his breathing as perfectly controlled as it is before a fight. Maybe he doesn't know the source of the problem, but he knows there is one, and Alistair can feel the situation slipping out of his control.

Under the pretext of finding a cloth to clean his hand and something a little gentler than the warming balm, he climbs to his feet and digs through his belongings once again, leaving Zevran kneeling alone by the fire. He takes his time finding the vial of oil and collecting a damp cloth from the table, scrupulously inspecting each. Part of him hopes that, if he takes long enough, Zevran will disobey the order to keep quiet, ask what's wrong or say the watchword. Not because Alistair wants this to end, but because it would be easier. If Zevran ends this, then Alistair doesn't have to choose.

Zevran, of course, says nothing, and when Alistair finally returns to the fire to stand behind him, he hasn't moved by so much as an inch. A bead of sweat runs down his arm as Alistair watches, all the way from shoulder to wrist before disappearing into the ropes, and Zevran's skin hardly twitches.

It's arousing and terrifying, much the way Alistair remembers from their first few weeks together, when he kept waiting to cross a line or for Zevran to tire of him and put an end to their games. To be allowed to want this was unthinkable for so long that he could hardly credit it, though time wore that fear away until Howe brought it back with a vengeance.

Alistair shivers. Of all the things he could think about right now, Howe's dungeon is the worst. Time with Zevran might be a good antidote to that, if only he could erase the last doubts lingering in the dark corners of his mind. He trusts Zevran, trusts what Zevran said to him in that garden in Redcliffe, and yet...he doesn't. Can't. Everything he saw in Howe's basement plays on fears that have been with him for years.

He doesn't want to look at Zevran and risk seeing all those fears confirmed, but he isn't quite that much of a coward. One deep breath to steel himself, then he steps around Zevran and turns to see his face. Which is as unreadable as ever, and fear rises up in Alistair, a wave ready to drown him. The fear reminds him how easily Zevran lies, how carefully he controls his face, how little Alistair really knows about him. How little Alistair will ever know about him.

But that's where the fear breaks against the wall of a different memory, of Zevran kneeling in the dirt, cheeks cold and damp with tears he didn't even seem to notice. In all these months, through the horrors of Kinloch Hold and the Deep Roads, through injuries severe enough to render him unconscious, Zevran has never shed a tear for any of it. Even when tears might have gained him something, he's only ever cried for Taliesin.

For Taliesin, and for Alistair.

Remembering it now, Alistair brushes his thumb over the fingers of the same hand, and for a moment, his fingertips feel wet. Maybe Zevran is better than most at hiding his thoughts, but he isn't perfect. If Alistair blocks out the fear that's still trying to undermine his confidence, he can read a question in the slight tilt of Zevran's eyebrows.

Zevran's cheek is smooth when Alistair touches it, and he doesn't jump at the unexpected contact. The slight shift that turns his face into Alistair's palm could be a product of Alistair's imagination. The question is whether Alistair is willing to trust that it wasn't.

"Look at me." The words come out in a hoarse whisper, without any of the authority he wanted them to have. They're a plea rather than an order.

Zevran obeys anyway, his eyes going straight to Alistair's the instant they open. His unspoken question is clearer now: "Do you want to stop?" Bound and helpless, there's no anger or fear in his face: he's just concerned, and not for himself.

The trust in that is staggering, and Alistair feels it in his chest, as overwhelming as the fear. Zevran is helpless. Zevran _lets_ himself be helpless, and for the first time, Alistair really thinks about what that means. He thinks about how often, early on, Zevran slipped free of his hold; never to mock him, never before they were finished with whatever game they were playing, but always easily. He thinks of the one time they did this before, Zevran with his hands tied but not his feet, holding that weapon in reserve.

He thinks about trust, and then he smiles down at Zevran and raises the hand holding the cloth and the oil. Careful to avoid words that still sometimes stick in his throat, he says, "I want to know how many more times you can do that."

Now that he isn't questioning himself, it's easy to see the spark of interest in Zevran's face, the smile that touches his eyes but not his mouth. Obedience holds him in place, but it isn't obedience that makes him eager.

"Eyes closed," he says, and Zevran's eyes close.

He steps around Zevran again, as slowly as he did before but for a different reason this time. Reluctance has turned back to anticipation, and as he kneels behind Zevran, it spreads outward through his body. Their skin touches in only a few places, but those places are nearly the only things he can think about as he sets the cloth and the oil on the rug.

Still moving carefully, deliberately, he pushes his fingers through Zevran's hair, up from the base of his skull, gathering the strands between his spread fingers. When his hand reaches the crown of Zevran's head, Alistair closes his hand and turns his wrist at the same time, pulling hard enough that Zevran's lips part involuntarily as his head is pulled to the side, leaving his neck exposed to Alistair's teeth.

Alistair touches his mouth to the muscle straining between neck and shoulder, a soft kiss that changes without warning to a hard bite. He savors the taste of Zevran's skin, licking the fold caught between his teeth before he sucks a mark into it.

When he's satisfied the mark will last for days, he places another gentle kiss on Zevran's ear and whispers, "Mine."

###

This was a game the Crows liked to play when they were training him, to push him over the edge again and again until his body was beyond exhaustion and his mind found someplace else to be for a little while. It taught him the real limits of his endurance, but it also served as a reminder: nothing he called his own truly belonged to him, not even his body. Everything belonged to the Crows, and they could do whatever they wanted with any of it.

Alistair, of course, has no way of knowing that, would be horrified if Zevran were to explain it to him. And Zevran would have to explain it; Alistair would never see it on his own. If Zevran calls a halt to this, or even directs Alistair's attention to some other game, Alistair will want to know why. After everything they've seen, he's still so naïve, and while it's often entertaining to broaden his horizons, this is the sort of thing Zevran would just as soon he never know.

Then Zevran remembers who it is kneeling behind him, and he almost laughs. If he wants this to stop, he has only to say the word. Alistair would _want_ to know why, but it wouldn't occur to him to make this a trade, an explanation in return for his agreement.

Alistair's whispered "mine" sounds nothing like the Crows'.

Like hearing "I trust you" said aloud, it changes everything. Zevran could tolerate this under any circumstances, give Alistair the reactions he wants, but tonight, he's not just tolerating it; he's enjoying it. When he opens his eyes to Alistair's concerned frown, he wants to say a hundred things, and none of them are the watchword. And when Alistair shows him the oil, makes it plain he intends to do exactly what the Crow masters did, it isn't revulsion or resignation Zevran feels.

Because whatever superficial similarities there are, nothing about tonight makes Zevran want to be elsewhere. Even as his muscles strain and his cock burns and the outside world retreats, his mind stays centered in his body. More centered than it ever is outside of a fight or in that last instant before he drops from the shadows onto some unsuspecting target.

Which is strange, when he feels so off-center physically. He's not allowed to move, and so Alistair's chest against his back is the only thing keeping him upright. It makes him feel like he's floating, caught on the edge of falling without ever hitting the ground.

He recognizes the sensation, though this is only the third time he's felt it. Once in a tent beside some unnamed Fereldan road, rain pouring down on the canvas above their heads, when he didn't know enough to understand what was happening. Once in a rented room in a Denerim tavern, Taliesin's death a gaping wound draining him dry, when he didn't care enough about anything to stop it.

Tonight, he can feel it creeping up on him, and he knows how to fend it off, but he doesn't even try. This isn't the aching numbness of the night Taliesin died, and it isn't the ignorant bravado of that night in the rain. He has the experience now to know what will happen if he lets go, and enough sense to be afraid of it.

He lets go anyway.

###

Alistair doesn't bother to keep count. This isn't a tournament, where he needs to know how many points he's received. It isn't about winning. It isn't about anything except the weight of Zevran's body growing heavier as he relies more and more on Alistair to hold him up.

The fire has burned low before he stops. Zevran has moved beyond shaking, his head lolling against Alistair's shoulder as if he's too exhausted to even hold it steady. Every breath stutters in his throat, and his heart is beating so fast Alistair can feel it, and yet, when Alistair goes to untie him at last, Zevran presses closer whenever Alistair tries to put even a few inches between them.

The ropes untied, Alistair has to straighten Zevran's limbs for him, rubbing at stiff joints with one hand while Zevran lies curled in his lap, back supported by Alistair's other arm. His eyes remain closed the whole time, his face calm, as if the peaceful quiet in Alistair's head is filling his, too.

He's startlingly light when Alistair picks him up; for all the times Alistair has fucked him against walls or grabbed him in the middle of a game, Zevran has never allowed himself to be carried like this. Or rather, Alistair has never dared to try. Another intimacy he's never reached for, afraid of being denied.

Now Zevran makes no effort to slip free or turn this into a joke. He's silent as Alistair carries him to the table and washes him clean, silent as Alistair carries him to the bed and tucks him beneath the blankets, silent as Alistair climbs into bed and curls up behind him.

Alistair arranges their bodies, Zevran's back against his chest, his arm holding Zevran close. Zevran exhales on a sigh and curls into him, his ass rubbing against Alistair's cock, still hard between them. "Amo?" he mumbles, one shaking hand reaching back to slide up Alistair's thigh.

"Shhh." Alistair catches that wandering hand and pins it lightly to the mattress in front of them. He's hard, yes, but he's also satisfied, as much as if he did find his own release. "Go to sleep."

Zevran's answer is an inarticulate noise, his breath already slowing, and Alistair kisses the top of his head, sleepy and content.

As he closes his eyes, the darkness settles around them. It reminds him of other, darker places, and words rise up inside him, a prayer that's nearly worn a path through his head.

_There is no darkness in the Maker's Light._

So much darkness lately, so many places the Maker will never touch, and yet, here in this darkness, he feels closer to the Light than he has in a long time. Years. Since the first time he realized that the Chantry would call him a monster, if they knew the things he thought about at night. He remembers those nights far too well, alone in the darkness even when he was surrounded by other templar recruits.

Now he breathes in the smell of Zevran's hair and his lips form the words silently, wonderingly. _I am not alone._

They echo in his head all night, but every time they wake him, Zevran is sleeping peacefully beside him, close enough to touch, and when they wake him for the last time, just before dawn, Zevran is still there.

No longer asleep, though: he's rolled over so they're face-to-face, and his eyes are intent, his eyebrows drawn down in thought. Before Alistair can even begin to worry, the frown melts into a smile that lights up his face.

"Good morning, cachorro," he murmurs as he leans in for a kiss. It's not a quick one, either: it's long and slow, his tongue slipping into Alistair's mouth as his body molds itself to Alistair's, his hands sliding easily over whatever skin he can reach.

By the time he pulls back, Alistair is wide awake and panting. "G-good morning." For once, the stutter doesn't embarrass him. He thinks anyone would be off balance after being woken like that, and besides, he likes the way it makes Zevran smirk.

Feeling very daring, he cups Zevran's cheek in one hand and brushes his thumb over Zevran's lips. "What were you thinking about, just now?"

Zevran grins wickedly. "Shall I show you?" But when Alistair opens his mouth to protest the diversion, Zevran's smile fades back into seriousness. "I was remembering."

"Remembering?"

Zevran leans in and says against his mouth, "Remembering that you are not a Crow." The kiss is slower this time, soft until Zevran nips at his lower lip hard enough to sting. "And once I remembered, I was considering the ways in which I could show you how glad that makes me." Alistair can feel him smile. "Would you care to offer a suggestion or two?"

It takes Alistair a moment to stop stammering and blushing, and even then, the best he can manage is, "You pick."

"In that case..." Zevran murmurs. He kisses Alistair again, quickly, before sliding out of bed to pad across the room to the cold hearth.

The dawn light is enough for Alistair to see by, and he's content to lie there watching Zevran do nothing more exciting than retrieve the vial of oil--now nearly empty--from where Alistair left it last night.

Zevran turns and catches him looking, but Alistair just shrugs a shoulder and smiles a little, saying without words, "Who could blame me?" Smirking, Zevran stretches his arms over his head and arches his back, putting himself on display. He's entirely unselfconscious, and Alistair envies him that even as he admires the play of tattooed skin over muscle.

As they so often do, the tattoos draw Alistair's eyes down to Zevran's cock, half hard and growing harder. Zevran reaches down to run light fingers down the shaft and around the head, and Alistair swallows as his own cock twitches in response. The memory of last night is close enough to touch, the heat of Zevran's body against his, the slick glide of his hand over Zevran's cock.

Which is still chafed this morning, if Zevran's careful movements are anything to go by. Just the blood filling it must hurt, the skin stretching as it lengthens and thickens, and Alistair frowns, the ghost of last night's fears ready to steal the brightness from the morning.

"Doesn't that hurt?" he asks, knowing the answer is yes but hoping desperately that Zevran will hear the real question and answer that one instead.

Zevran's smirk widens into a smile that's somehow both satisfied and hungry. "Oh yes." He strokes his fingers over his cock again, teasing both of them. "It hurts beautifully."

The air in the room is thick as honey, but Alistair drags it into his lungs anyway so that he can growl, "Come _here_."

He gives it good odds that Zevran will stay where he is, grinning the grin that dares Alistair to make him obey. Which Alistair wouldn't object to doing, but Zevran is already walking toward him. Alistair allows him enough time to set the oil on the pillow before pulling him down and into a kiss.

Their time this morning is limited, and knowing it might be their last only makes Alistair want to hold on to it longer. Even if they survive until tonight, that doesn't mean they'll have forever. Zevran only promised to stay for a while, and although Alistair is beginning to believe that "a while" will be a much longer time than people normally mean when they use those words, he doesn't know whether that belief is based in truth or only in hope.

But he doesn't want to think about that now, so he drowns out his thoughts with Zevran's body and Zevran's voice. They wrestle on the bed, a mock fight that neither of them does a good job of pretending is real, Alistair laughing until Zevran rolls over beneath him and arches up to drive his ass back against Alistair's cock. It's too blatant an invitation to resist, and the oil is so conveniently in reach, and Alistair is too breathless to laugh anymore.

There's no longer a danger of thinking about anything but this: Zevran on his hands and knees, Alistair's hand fisted in his hair and Alistair's teeth leaving marks along his neck and shoulder as he fucks Zevran in short, hard thrusts. His one attempt to wrap his hand around Zevran's cock gets him a hissed warning, but even that isn't enough to revive his fears. He takes it at face value and puts his hand on Zevran's hip instead, digging his fingers in hard enough to leave bruises.

At least, he hopes they will.

Then he can't think enough to hope for anything. The release that didn't matter last night burns inside him now, driving his hips faster, until it spills out of him on a gasp, his body jerked into stillness pressed tight against Zevran's.

When he has control over himself again, he rolls Zevran onto his back, fucks him with three fingers and sucks his cock, mouth as gentle as he knows how to make it. The skin under his tongue is raw, but his mouth is softer than the rough callouses on his palm, and Zevran doesn't push him away.

By now, he knows Zevran's body nearly as well as he knows his own, and his fingers find the right spot easily, rubbing over it as he takes Zevran's cock to the back of his throat. He could do this just as easily with one finger, but he likes the feel of it, his fingers moving against each other inside Zevran, knowing it isn't just the oil making them slide so easily in and out. One of a thousand things he hadn't known was possible until Zevran, and he still remembers the shock of it in his gut, those moments when he was too overwhelmed to be ashamed.

Nose buried in the curls at the base of Zevran's cock, Alistair raises his eyes to look up the length of Zevran's body. Despite straining muscles and tightly clenched teeth, Zevran is looking back, and at Alistair's eyes rather than his mouth. He's on the edge but holding onto his control the way he so often does, and Alistair wants nothing more than to see him let go the way he did last night.

Without breaking eye contact, Alistair presses up with his fingers and swallows around Zevran's cock. Zevran groans, his head falling back to the pillow as his hips try to thrust up against Alistair's weight pinning him to the bed. His body is still spent, but Alistair swallows the few drops that hit his tongue and doesn't raise his head until Zevran's muscles go lax.

Alistair crawls up the bed to lie beside him, and Zevran immediately rolls onto his side to put them face-to-face. He's gasping for breath, eyes shut as his mouth searches blindly for Alistair's and his hands reach out, movements jerky and uncoordinated. When Alistair cups his cheek to guide their mouths together, he shivers, and when their lips meet, he presses into the kiss as desperately as if he isn't still shaking from his release.

 _I am not alone._ The words have been a shield to protect him and a scourge to punish him. For the first time, they feel like the promise they were meant to be. Whatever their chances of surviving today, whatever "a while" means, Alistair will thank the Maker for every moment he's given.

###

Zevran floats in a haze of pain, more content than he's ever been. His muscles tremble from overuse, his wrists and ankles burn from the rope, and his cock aches from Alistair's hands and mouth, and yet, he revels in every twinge. Elfroot will take it all away from him soon enough, but for now he can lie here, warm and aching with Alistair's lips moving softly against his.

The sunrise, alas, is beyond his control, and soon enough they're throwing back the blankets to ready themselves for the day. They move around each other in something that isn't quite a routine but that might become one, given time. Is it possible to have a memory of something that hasn't happened yet? Zevran decides that it is, because he has one now, a memory-to-be of this morning, of a hundred mornings like it. How smoothly would they step around each other after a thousand mornings? After ten thousand? At what point would he take Alistair's smile for a given, even if he never takes it for granted?

His chest tightens, reality momentarily as unreal as a dream. If they survive today, he'll get to find out, and that seems more miraculous than any story of the Maker's return, more unbelievable than anything he ever saw in the Fade. Even his emotions feel unreal, too intense as they move through him. Everything is bright and sharp, and the wall that normally protects him from his emotions is more of a curtain.

He works on rebuilding that wall as he bathes and dresses, and by the time he's combing out his hair, he's starting to feel less like a cracked pitcher, leaking emotions everywhere. With a small sigh of relief, he starts on his first braid, only to stop when Alistair steps close and touches the back of his hand.

"Here," Alistair murmurs, as if he's offering Zevran something.

Zevran makes an inquisitive noise and glances over at him, then has to hold back a blink of surprise when Alistair combs out the beginning of the first braid. "I think we lack the time for anything interesting this morning," he teases, pulling his head gently away from Alistair's hand.

One corner of Alistair's mouth turns up, his eyes fixed on Zevran's hair. "Probably." He cups the opposite side of Zevran's head, fingers spread wide to keep him from moving. "So hold still."

Baffled, Zevran does as he's told, trying to interpret the way Alistair is pulling firmly at his hair. Whatever he's doing, there's a pattern to the tugging, first one way and then the other, as if he's...

Oh.

Alistair's fingers are surprisingly deft, and he finishes the first braid in hardly more time than it would have taken Zevran. He didn't have the angle quite right to start with, so the top is too short and the bottom too long, leaving the braid to hang oddly. Zevran would cut out his own tongue before he would mention it, but Alistair makes a vaguely irritated noise and undoes his work to start over.

It takes him three tries to get it right. When the first braid is finished, he steps around to work on the second, and Zevran focuses on breathing steadily. Foolish, to feel tears burning his eyes over something like this. A hundred lovers have marked their presence by unwinding the braids and leaving his hair mussed.

None of them ever put it back together again after.

Alistair only needs one try for the second braid, and tying them together is a simple matter. When it's done, Alistair stands behind him a moment longer, stroking idly along one of the braids, his other hand curled around Zevran's shoulder.

"You'll be here later?" Alistair asks. "After, I mean."

"If I survive to be anywhere," Zevran says, the joke instinctive. Then he fights those same instincts to say very quietly, "If _you_ survive."

It's not a question, but something eases in his chest when Alistair nods. "I'll try," he says. "I won't...I'll let...Morrigan can do her ritual. I just want..." He breaks off, exhales sharply through his nose. "You'll stay? You meant it?"

There's so much hope and fear in his voice that Zevran has to close his eyes. He's convinced a hundred people that being with them was the only thing he desired, so why can he not convince Alistair now, when he truly means it?

Except perhaps those skills are the problem, have always been the problem. He abandons a dozen eloquent and witty declarations, strips away everything but the raw truth. "Soy tuyo," he says, and means it. "I am yours."

He knows those aren't the three words Alistair wants to hear, but they're the best he can do right now. The Crows spent two decades crafting him into their perfect weapon, and they cut those words out of him almost from the start. Whether that part of him is gone for good or might one day grow back, Zevran can't say, only that it isn't there now.

Alistair's fingers tighten on his shoulder as if Zevran tried to pull away, and Zevran struggles to find something else he can say. At last, he offers, "If you wish me to be here, then here is where I will be."

Strong arms go around his ribs, pulling him back against Alistair's chest, and Zevran lets himself relax into the embrace. Alistair's head tilts, his forehead coming to rest on the crown of Zevran's head, his breath stirring the unbraided strands of hair as he whispers, "Even if that's forever?"

"Yes, cachorro." A promise a Crow should never make, not in seriousness, but then, how often does someone knowingly ask a Crow for anything like it? "So long as I breathe, I am yours."


End file.
